22nd August 2019 – (Hong Kong) How did the young female protester who ruptured her right eye on 11th August allegedly shot by bean bag round became the new official spokesperson for the pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong?
According to sources, despite being able to see light, the 22 year old girl still has blurry vision and she will need to undergo reconstruction surgery and it may take a long time to recover.
Police have been trying to obtain a statement from the woman but she has repetitively refused to give one and strangely, she has not even filed a police report to-date. It cannot be ascertained until today if she has been injured by beanbag round or ball bearing shot by steel pellet guns by other protesters.
Is there a reason why she doesn’t want to come forward to speak to the police to reveal her actual condition? Is she going to lose her eyesight permanently in the near future or she is on the way to a slow recovery? OR Did someone tell her to rest and not to appear in public so that she can be continuously used as a propaganda tool?
The girl’s entire medical expenses were footed by the controversial 612 Humanitarian Relief Fund which is allegedly linked to Jimmy Lai, owner of Next Media. Apple Daily has also contributed HK$300,000 directly into the fund.
This female protester with a pretty face is definitely not your average girl-next-door. As an active protester, she was spotted distributing money during the past street rallies to other protesters.
Anti-extradition protesters have leveraged on her injury hours after the horrific incident to organise an airport siege for two days on 12th and 13th August. Many online posters with caption ‘ AN EYE FOR AN EYE’ were shared as if the victim has lost one eye. She has been conveniently used by protesters as their propaganda spokesperson to expose police brutality around the world without having her medical condition proven. The fact that she has been holding back information about her actual medical condition makes us wonder if she has secretly agreed to be used as the new face of protesters to gain empathy in Hong Kong and around the world.
The powerful image of a girl with one eye has become more popular than Katy Perry in less than 2 weeks. In most rallies held locally or in other parts of the world, students, protesters, medical professionals and local actors have covered their right eye either with a patch or with a hand to show solidarity with the injured girl by indirectly condemning police brutality.
The latest ‘eye for Hong Kong’ campaign started by Kim Ui-Seong, a famous South Korean actor from ‘Train to Busan’ fame who posted a selfie on his Instagram account covering his right eye is akin to the recent #bottlecapchallenge as it can easily create a ripple effect on social media. The eye campaign was also endorsed yesterday by the team at Deep Dive for Fox Nation, with Anna Cheung, Bill McGurn and Jillian Melchior of The Wall Street Journal, and Mike Gonzalez of The Heritage Foundation. Fox News Channel has been widely described as providing biased reporting in favor of conservative political positions, the Republican Partyand President Donald Trump.
The more brownie points social media campaigns score for the girl, the less respect will be accorded to the Hong Kong police force. The potential destruction on their image can reach beyond repair. A simple, well orchestrated and ingenious play on emotions has allowed the mastermind to checkmate the Hong Kong government and police as her case has corroborated the account of police brutality even though it was not proven. Hong Kong Police has already been sentenced and tried in the court of public opinion as GUILTY.
Many have forgotten that it was an illegal street rally and the protesters were just thrilled to shortlist another ‘crime’ committed by the embattled police force. Meanwhile, protesters continued to seek foreign intervention to sanction individuals in Hong Kong for suppressing human rights. In our article earlier, we mentioned that at the centre of this ironic deadlock, protesters still chose to look to the West to condemn the actions of the Hong Kong government and police when the West was in fact the forerunner of police brutalities.
A prominent French anti-government “yellow vest” activist was badly injured in the eye during a protest in January 2019 after he was struck with one of the controversial rubber bullets used by police. Jerome Rodrigues’ lawyer feared he would be “handicapped for life” after he was injured in clashes with police in Paris during an 11th straight weekend of protests against President Emmanuel Macron.
However his eye injury did not trigger a ripple effect around the world as there was no mastermind behind orchestrating it. Riot police around the world have shot and injured many protesters especially in illegal street rallies as they are unavoidable during clashes.
We are not trying to justify the actions of the police but at least the injured girl should lodge a police report and make a public statement officially as to the condition of her eye. It is now in the public interest for the whole world to know if she has really lost the eye and if she was indeed shot by police.
